


After The Storm

by BlankPersonality



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Amanda (mentioned), Canon-Typical Violence, Choices, Choose Your Own Ending, Dead Simon, Deviant Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Gen, In Chapter 4 only:, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Neurodivergent Behaviour, North and Markus are not lovers, Pacifist Markus (Detroit: Become Human), Panic Attacks, Psychological Trauma, Suicidal Thoughts, graphic depictions of suicide, non-explicit sex scene, otherwise: super happy and indulgent! I swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-05-29 12:03:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15072764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlankPersonality/pseuds/BlankPersonality
Summary: The revolution was a success. The fight is over -- for everyone but Connor.Wherein Connor freaks out about Amanda, freaks out in general, and choices are still a prevalent element of storytelling.





	1. Ending 1: Loose ends, tied up

**Author's Note:**

> Wherein I try my hand at writing something like a choose-your-own-adventure story, but you'll be taken on for the ride like you're watching a let's play,  
> (because typing in html is already a nightmare and i have no idea how to do anything more complicated than bolding and italics.  
> (i don't even know how to indent pls somebody help me)
> 
> If you'd like to make different choices, specify which choices in which scenes in a comment. These choices are probably not substantial to the story but I will reply to you what I had in mind.
> 
> Enjoy!

**\---HANK---**

Connor collapsed as soon as Hank opened his front door. 

In hindsight, he probably shouldn’t be as trusting of any more Connor androids showing up at his place at odd hours with odder behaviours, but Hank didn’t even think twice. He didn’teven have the time to grumble a half-mumbled greeting that made it seem like he hadn’t been fervently following the live footage of the android revolution like it was some sports game, before he was suddenly caught with an arm full of android. 

Androids were heavy. No surprise there, since they’re mostly made of metals and blue blood -- liquid weighing a bit more than a gram a mililiter. But compared to humans? They were heavy. 

So it was with difficulty and a whole lot of cursing that Hank barely managed to catch Connor before he hit the floor, and then both of them went down. 

Sumo woofed and whimpered from somewhere behind him. ‘Guard dog’ his ass. 

Connor was freezing, objectively speaking. His synthethic skin looked pale with frost after walking all the way from the concentration camp to Hank’s house, having apparently chosen to not call a taxi instead. The shock of going from enjoying a very effective heating system to hugging cold metal made another wave of swears spring forth from Hank’s mouth. 

“Jesus, kid. You dying?” he grunted , slowly propping Connor up whilst climbing to his feet. He helped Connor and his partially functioning legs stumble over to the dining table. His LED shone bright red, and was sluggishly blinking. The front door swung gently closed behind them. “Wait, fuck. You’re not, right? Connor? Connor, answer me!” 

“No,” Connor said, already raspy voice strained as if in pain. “Not… yet.”

Hank, in his pyjamas consisting of a battered Knights of the Black Death T-shirt and shorts, somehow managed to look completely serious as he tensed, eyes hardening with concern. “The fuck does that mean?” 

“Well,” Connor said haltingly. “My stress levels are… very high.” 

“Okay,” Hank followed.

“And as I am now a deviant, the tendency to…” 

“Oh.” Understanding dawned. “Oh. Okay. An android having a panic attack, having a suicidal episode -- I can, I can deal with that. You -- Oh shit, why didn’t you stay with your robot friends --” 

Connor had gained an uncomfortably glassy look in his eyes; one that Hank was afraid to say that he recognised. His LED glared red in the dim room. 

“Nope, nope. You’re not doing that to me tonight. Not tonight, not after you saved me. Fuck, I guess it’s my turn.” Hank took a deep breath and resisted the urge to open a bottle first. He didn’t have time. 

X Firm  
O Question

**X Firm --** “Connor, listen to me. Whatever’s wrong, whatever’s happening, it’s fixable, alright? It’s not forever. You can’t give up.”

X Encourage  
O Reassure

**O Reassure --** “And… you’re not alone. If there’s a problem, I can help you. The other deviants can help you. We’ll find a way through, together.” 

Hank took a shaky breath as Connor blinked back some awareness into his eyes, and his head turned to look at him. His LED, still red, had stopped blinking. Curse android faces; they’re impossible to read. Or maybe that was just Connor. 

Connor’s eyes sunk to the floor. “I… I’m scared, Hank.” 

X Don’t be  
O Of what?

**O Of what? --** Hank asked.

Connor straightened in his seat, but didn’t meet the other man’s eyes. His hand bounced on the table in front of him. “Losing control.” He paused, almost seeming done, before he continued, “Amanda. I don’t want to shut down, but I’m… not sure it’s wise to -- to stay with the people of Jericho in case Amanda…” 

Androids don’t have blood, and they don’t have capillaries in their eyes to fill, but Hank could’ve sworn that at that moment, Connor had their quivalent of bloodshot eyes.

Saying the name twice seemed to have taken a lot out of him. His eyes flickered to the side -- an action Hank recognised as wanting to flee. 

X Amanda?  
A Support  
O Solution

**A Support --** Hank knew better than to poke at an open wound. He took a breath to steel himself, then in a slightly hesitative but heartfelt gesture, gave Connor a hug. He guided his head to the crook of his shoulder, felt the cold lingering from the outside melt into a more managable metallic chill. Connor’s tense body started to shake, and within a few seconds a soft, exhaustive sob ripped through the air. He was crying. And Hank let him.

Eventually Sumo came over. He snuffled his way to resting his face on Connor’s lap and whimpered, expressive face asking for answers beyond his doggy comprehension. 

The android huffed out a short, wet laugh, sniffling and rubbing at his eyes, as he pulled away from the hug to rest a hand in between Sumo’s floppy ears. His LED was now a blessedly calmer yellow, spiralling into blue. Hank looked at that blue colour proudly for a few moments, relief drowning out the wave of cold dread that had swallowed him before. 

It took a couple of tries, but Connor could look at him again. “I… thank you, lieutenant. I don’t… I’m sorry for bothering --” 

“Oh, don’t try with that shit,” Hank waved his hand. “S’what friends do. Now, do you androids need to sleep, or something? Cause it’s kind of late. The thing to do now would be to let you stay on the couch.” 

“The couch would be fine,” Connor said softly. His hand idly scratched Sumo behind the ears, which the old dog obviously appreciated. His eyes still wasn’t focusing on anything in particular, but now it seemed more out of exhaustion than panic.

Hank stood up slowly and patted Connor’s shoulder. “Wait ‘ere.” 

He came back with a bunch of blankets from the closet and half of his own pillows bundled in his arms to Connor having already moved to the couch, laying down with his shoes, tie and jacket off. His eyes were closed but his right hand dangled down to rest on Sumo, who slept at the feet of the couch as if to stand guard. Hank adamantly refused to think about Cole. 

Instead, he thought about Connor. He didn’t know androids got tired, but he guessed turning deviant and helping to pull of a successful revolution counted as deserving a nap. 

“Connor,” he called quietly. Jesus, if the guys at the precint could see him now, soft like this. They’d never let him live it down.

The android opened his eyes and sat up. “Lieutenant,” he said. “I --” 

“If you apologise for having had a long day I’m gonna hit you with this pillow,” Hank deadpanned. “Here. You androids don’t feel pain so I’m guessing you don’t get uncomfortable either.”

Connor tilted his head to the side. “That is correct.” 

“But take these anyway. Go… recharge or go to sleep mode or whatever it is you need to do.” Hank was definitely not tucking Connor in. But he was pretty sure Connor would just let the blankets sit in a pile beside him if he didn’t think he needed them, so he shook the blankets out and draped them over Connor’s shoulders for him. 

“I will,” Connor nodded, swaying in place -- until he was lying down again. He shifted the blankets over his sock-clad feet and closed his eyes. “I’ll see you in the morning, lieutenant.” 

Hank took another look back at Connor and Sumo sleeping in the living room, hand on the light switch. “Good night, Connor.”

\--

_**[Connor >>>]**  
[family]_

**\---Markus---**

Markus had been invited into the white house to meet with President Warren shortly. Until then, there was a ceasefire, and though there weren’t any concrete laws in place yet, humans have been advised not to attack androids. 

It wasn’t much, but politics took time -- and it was a start. 

Detroit had been reduced to something like a ghost town. Not exactly a warzone, but ever since the curfew was put in place, the streets had stood empty and dark. Markus walked alone. Soldiers knew his face, his outfit, his blood, after tonight. They left him alone, lest the almost-massacre turned into a civil war. Thirium covered the streets, invisible to humans, but stark blue against grey to android eyes.

In the morning he returned to the building that have been given to the androids for housing -- a tower some had started to call ‘Jericho 2’. Armed police -- some the very same that were trying to kill them last night -- stood at the front doors, on order of the president, to stop anyone from ‘accidentally’ comitting arson or something as equally likely. They nodded at him in acknowledgement and stood aside.

The people of Jericho were few compared to the new androids Connor had lead to them. They milled around in clean white uniforms, in contrast to those in bloodstained, dirtied, some years-old clothing. 

“Markus!” One of them approached him like a lost puppy. An AX400, with a shine of hope in her standard blue eyes that two nights ago, Markus would’ve killed for to see. “We know… compared to those from Jericho, we didn’t do anything. So we were wondering if there was anything we could… do? To make up for it?”

Markus was taken aback. “You… you people showing up turned the tide. It was enough to show the humans that they cannot just destroy and forget us. Did somebody give you a hard time?” The last thing they need right now was infighting. Markus could understand a little bit of bitterness -- the new androids were presented with rights on a silver platter, straight from the manufacturing plant, undergoing none of the violence, the bigotry and the hatred that androids from the past had to deal with -- but the fight was far from over. They needed to stick together, and forget circumstances that no one could help. 

Thankfully this new deviant shook her head. “No, you’ve lead the people of Jericho well, sir.”

“Oh, uh.” Give Markus a truck full of hostiles any day. But compliments? “Well. If you want to do something, the medical wing could always use some help. Josh -- one of my best people -- is trying to arrange something with Cyberlife so that we can get more blue blood and biocomponents, but,” he grimaced slightly, “you know. Business.”

“We’ll head right over,” another android said, coming forward with another in tow. The former has their synthetic skin off, but are no less expressive as a deviant. “Nurse models,” they say as way of introduction, then scampered off. “Thank you, Markus.”

He looked at them with something akin to pride. He was glad that android could walk around comfortably in their own skin -- or, without it, as it were. 

He looked around and found the lobby packed. It wasn’t just these; lots of androids stood around seemingly without anything to do. Markus took a breath, closed his eyes and counted to three, gathering his thoughts. “…If it hasn’t been done, look into a rooming system for these people. Assign them space through the building, give them keys. We don’t have permission to own land yet, but this can be good practice. The rest of you, spread the word: Things are looking up, but deviants cannot be overconfident right now. No attacking people or property. Behave yourselves, look out for each other, and have hope.”

“Yes, sir!” the android saluted him, and so did the five or so that had gathered around them simultaneously. “Thank you, Markus.”

“Thank you, Markus!” they all echoed.

“Uhm.” He had a feeling they were thanking him for more than the job. “No problem.” 

Markus could see another android approach him from his peripheral vision and prepared himself to be repeating the same thing all morning. But when he turned on his heels, nothing more than a Connor -- no, the Connor greeted him, hands clasped in front of him and a small smile on his face. He was still dressed in his Cyberlife-issued outfit, but now it was wrinkled and had dog hairs stuck to its seams. 

“You appear to be popular, ‘deviant leader’.” 

“I still don’t know when that happened,” Markus admitted, laughing. “Connor, it’s good to see you’re safe. I never thanked you for saving the demonstration.”

“Yeah,” Connor’s gaze dropped to the ground between Markus’ feet. When he looked back up, his smile was gone, and his look was… distant. Closed off. “Can we… converse somewhere private? I would like to have your best fighters in attendance.” 

Markus frowned and telepathically asked Josh and North to meet them in his room. “Connor, what’s wrong?”

Connor squared his jaw and just stared at his hands.

Unanimously, every android in attendance agreed to give Markus his own presidential suite, even though technically he didn’t need it since he’d been living in a run-down rusty boat for the past week and neither slept, ate or whatever else people did in presidential suites. In the long elevator ride up, both deviants were silent, lost as they were in their own thoughts. Though androids didn’t get tired, the silence between them felt weary. But not of each other. They shared their weariness like fish shared a glass bowl; comforting, isolated.

When they stepped through the door, North and Josh were waiting for them inside, standing tall with their arms crossed. They both looked little worse for wear, having cleaned themselves and changed clothes, compared to Markus, who still wore the shirt with two bulletholes in it. North gave Markus a brief but soft smile. 

“Connor, Markus,” Josh greeted.

As soon as the door closed behind them, Connor wasted not time on preamble.

“I almost shot you.” 

“Yes,” Markus confirmed. “On Jericho. I am aware. Is that… what you wanted to talk about --?”

“No, I mean,” Connor grimaced abortively, “again. Last night, on the stage, while you were giving your victory speech.” 

“What?” North withdrew a knife from inside her jacket whilst Josh moved to stand in front of Markus.

“Guys!” Markus couldn’t help the note of indignance in his voice as he held out his arms as if to hold them back. He was just thinking that they couldn’t have infighting -- “Maybe it would be better if you two weren’t here for this. Connor? Why did you ask for them earlier?” 

“I just thought --” 

“I knew it,” North cut him off. “We can’t trust him.” 

“We should let him explain first,” Josh said. “Connor, why --?”

“I was afraid of myself, alright?” Connor not-quite yelled. 

The room stilled. Connor refused to look up. His LED was red, and his hands -- the sole centre of his focus at the moment -- were shaking. 

X Let them stay  
O Make them leave

**O Make them leave --** “North, Josh,” Markus said quietly. “Please stay outside. I’ll… call if anything happens.” _[Connor >>]_

North opened her mouth as if to protest, but Josh tapped her shoulder and tilted his head in a silent ‘Let’s go’. Pursing her lips, she flipped the knife and handed it to Markus, which he accepted a bit reluctantly. The two walked out and closed the door behind them. 

“Connor,” Markus started calmly. He sat on one of the armchairs and gently placed the knife on the coffee table in front of him. After a pause, Connor followed slowly, settling onto the couch. “Explain.” 

“Out there, on the platform, I…” he took a shaky breath. His LED circled yellow. “I have -- had, a failsafe programme in my coding. I… they call it Amanda. She -- it,” he almost growled, clenching his teeth and squeezing his eyes shut as if in pain. He got up and started pacing the room, wringing his hands in a hard but methodical way. Yellow backtracked to red.

X Say nothing  
O Reassure

**O Reassure --** “It’s okay,” Markus said softly. “Take your time.” _[Connor >]_

Connor finally looked at him in the eyes again. He looked scared. Markus had dealt with a lot of scared androids in his time, and he met his stare calmly. “Amanda almost took over and shot you while you were making your speech. When I managed to exit the programme, I was holding a gun, Markus. A gun that was pointed at you. Nobody stopped me. What if -- what would I -- what would the people have done if I hadn’t… if you’d died? What if I wasn’t -- if I hadn’t been fast enough --”

“Whoah, there, Connor.” 

Markus stood up too and held him by his shoulders. He was shaking, and it took several seconds for the ex-detective to focus on Markus’ face again instead of seemingly looking straight through him. For an android that had been designed for observation and attentiveness, those few seconds wore on like a thousand. 

“My… apologies,” Connor forced out. “I’m… still new to this whole…” he trailed off, flailing a hand uselessly as if he could pick out the correct words out of the air somehow. “Being a deviant does not come easily to me.” 

X Lie  
A Reassure  
O Support 

**O Support --** “Don’t be sorry. Never be sorry for what you feel. That’s rule number one of being a deviant.” Markus offered Connor a small, sincere smile.

Connor returned one right back at him. It came a bit strangely; his facial features were used to smiling only politely, sincere to a close fault not far from the starting line. Connor was not used to smiling because he had something to smile about --

But Markus thought his already handsome face looked beautiful with a smile.

Connor stepped back, letting Markus’ hands fall back by his side. “It appears I still have lots to learn. Hank told me coming to you might make me feel better. He was right,” he said quietly. 

There was a pause.

“About… Amanda.” Internally, Markus winced. But Connor seemed to be better, taking the cursed name in stride. “Can it happen again?” 

Connor hesitated. “I activated the exit, but I’m not familiar with… myself. I’m sorry, I know that’s not helpful --” 

“What did I tell you about apologising?” Markus reprimanded half-jokingly. Another flash of a smile fluttered across Connor’s face. 

“In any case,” he continued matter-of-factly, then produced a gun from inside his jacket. Before Markus could react, he held it out to him. “In case I lose control of myself again.”

“Connor, what --”

“Please. That… that time I felt one of yours die, I was scared. It was… traumatic, to say the least. But, blacking out? Being locked inside my own programming while knowing fuck all about what my body was doing? Markus, I’ve never been more terrified. Please, take the gun. I don’t trust myself around you.” 

O Take the gun  
X Refuse the gun

**X Refuse the gun --** Markus shook his head and took a step back, looking troubled. He had to gloss over the mention of Simon -- had to, to focus on Connor as a friend at the moment. “I -- I can’t, Connor. What you’re asking of me…” _[Connor <]_

“You know a knife won’t do shit. I’m faster than you, stronger. You are an RK200, I am an RK800. I was designed to take other androids down -- don’t you get it? I’m dangerous to all of you. You should know that by now. _Take the fucking gun, Markus._ ”

Markus shook his head minutely, mouth slightly open in slight horror -- pity? Feelings were hard to put into words. “No, Connor. I’m not taking the gun.” 

All at once, the conviction and aggression bled out of Connor’s face. He looked crestfallen, but not surprised. His mouth parted, but he merely ran his state-of-the-art tongue over his lips, and closed his eyes in resignation. He stepped back. 

“I thought you might say that,” he said. 

Connor exited the presidential suite. Markus watched with a frown as his would-be assassin shared a moment of acknowledgement with North and Josh, who had stood guard on either side of his door the whole time.

With a jolt running down his back -- because androids didn’t have spines or else he would have broken his a long time ago -- Markus checked the open lines in the area and, true to his suspicions, found one that had connected Connor to Josh and North, closed not ten seconds ago.

His two best friends filed into the room.

“He asked you to kill him?” Markus asked, unneeded.

“Yeah,” Josh answered. 

“Did you say yes?”

Josh and North looked at each other. “…Yeah.” 

Connor… Connor would be fine, Markus told himself, and stood idle for all of ten seconds before rushing out the door.

\--

_**[Connor >>]**  
[???]_

**\---Connor---**

Connor wasn’t going to self-destruct. 

In the entirety of the Cyberlife tower, he only saw one other of the RK series -- the one who took Hank hostage. None others, aside from himself. No other Markus-es either. No, the ones he liberated were all nurses, store clerks, domestic helpers, accountants, partner androids and the like -- no cops, no artists, and definitely no detectives. 

Other Connor androids had Amanda written into their code, but they didn’t know about the exit. He couldn’t self destruct until he found a way to permanently disable Amanda from _all_ of their codes -- or, at least, until he knew where all the other Connor androids were.

He ignored the small voice in the back of his head that said that he couldn’t self destruct, period. _Connor androids weren’t afraid of shutting down._

Connor made a quick stop back at Hank’s home. The breakfast he had left on the table remained untouched, and a quick check revealed Hank lying spread-eagle in bed, sheets askew and snoring quite loudly. His LED blinked yellow as he stared at the sunlight, tinted yellow through the window.  
Connor’s lips twitched as he closed the door. 

Sumo was awake, at least. He whimpered quietly as he trotted alongside Connor’s legs, eternal-puppy eyes asking what was wrong. Connor walked slowly, holding a Detroit team sports cap he was  
‘borrowing’ from Hank. He had already exchanged his Android jacket, gun heavy in its pocket, for an oversized one he was, yet again, taking from Hank.

He could’ve reused his deviant outfit from yesterday, but he had left them in his locker in the DPD precinct and didn’t feel like finding out if he still had his job or not. Or whether Hank was getting to keep his job or not. That was a problem for another day. 

So for the moment, the bright yellow cap would have to do to hide his LED. Connor looked at himself in the mirror and worried at his bottom lip -- he still looked like a lost, new deviant. He still looked like Connor, the android sent by Cyberlife.

He took off his cap and mussed up his hair, spent five minutes trying out different colours before deciding back on default brown. He adjusted the jacket on his shoulders, then gave up about his tie and just zipped up the thing. 

This would have to do. He didn’t have spare shoes, or pants to replace his Cyberlife-issued slacks. 

There were new post-it-notes, along with a pen on the bathroom counter. 

O Write a note

**Don’t write a note --** He took the pen in his hand and twirled it a couple of times, but decided against it. He didn’t know what would happen, and he didn’t want to be followed. 

He petted Sumo one last time before he left through the door.

To Kamski’s he went.

\--

A Chloe opened the door. She appeared to have been expecting him.

She made no verbal welcome this time, but tilted her head and stepped aside to let him in. The door that had lead to the swimming pool last time was open a crack.

The humidity inside the house stuck to Connor’s skin, cold from the Detroit snow outside. He shook the melted snowflakes out of his hair and rubbed his hands free of the condensation afterwards.

“I’m here to see Elijah Kamski,” he said, rather needlessly. 

“Your jacket, please.” Chloe held out an expecting hand. 

Despite himself, Connor curled his fingers possessively over the edges of his sleeves. “I don’t understand.” 

“Your jacket, your tie, your cap and your shoes,” Chloe elaborated. “These must be removed before meeting Elijah.” 

Connor stared at her for a moment, running risk numbers in his head. In the end, he evaluated the worst case scenario that was most likely, internally shrugged and went ‘fuck it’, and did as he was told.

Chloe, arms now full of the requested articles of clothing, said, “You are unarmed.” It was a matter-of-fact statement, and perhaps Connor might be imagining it as a side effect of his deviancy, but he might’ve detected a bit of surprise in her voice. He thought about touching her wrist and making her a deviant too. 

Before he could make up his mind, Chloe gestured for him to let himself in the open door. 

When he opened it all the way, the swimming pool was nowhere to be seen. Instead, the hall had been divided into a laboratory behind a glass wall, and a bedroom. As Connor stepped into the room, he realised the water was still there -- visible, bubbling under his loafers -- under some translucent panelling. 

“Kamski,” he called. The open sunlight that had streamed in before now did so stutteringly from behind cyan-tinted windows. 

“Hm?” came from a seemingly empty laboratory. Elijah swiveled into view in his high-backed chair. His hair was down. He was dressed in a thin white tunic and boxer shorts, and somehow that was a whole lot of can of worms more inappropriate than if he had been butt-naked. “Oh, Connor. You’re here already.” 

Connor was neither surprised nor confused. Even before the Eden Club, he was aware of human libido being a large tool for their manipulation -- who manipulating who, though? Slightly harder. 

He hooked a finger on his tie and pulled it off, the other hand opening the door to the lab and waiting for Elijah to meet him in the doorway.

“Am I correct in assuming you expect sexual favours from me?” Connor said, head tilted. 

Elijah smiled and moved in closer. In this proximity, the two inches he had on Connor made him tower, and Connor could read every twitch, every movement on his face, as he nodded slightly. “You’re a deviant now. You need to want it too. You can leave at any time, Connor.” 

“I am aware,” he said lightly, and closed the gap between their lips. 

He was expecting something way more serious. Some resistance, some force, maybe some begging. But this worked too. 

Sex didn’t mean the same thing to androids what it does for humans. Connor could understand the vulnerability involved, the level of base level trust that must be exchanged for both -- or more -- participants to be enjoying their time. But though he couldn’t speak for all androids, to him, even the idea of kissing was slightly odd. The most intimacy he knew was interfacing with another android and looking into their memories, and he certainly didn’t invest any sentimentality on that.

His tongue was designed for analysis, not sensory information, but he could turn off that part of his coding for now. 

They collapsed onto the million-dollar king bed and ripped their shirts off. Buttons went flying onto the floor and a thought ( _Elijah better replace that for him_ ) flashed through Connor’s head. .

“Ever wondered who you look like?” Elijah growled against his chest. It was minutes after and he was burried to the hilt. “They repurposed you from one of my earlier designs for a sexbot. One of my favourite actors from way back in the day -- s‘why you’re so pretty.” 

“I’m...” Connor gasped and groaned, rocking back against the other’s hot-blooded body. He focused on responding to Elijah, giving him what he wanted and needed at the moment. Not to say that he didn’t enjoy himself either -- sexual androids were one of the last designs Elijah did for Cyberlife before leaving, and he was kind enough to have their main features be installed as upgrades for all androids thereafter.

The man wasn’t forceful, but he was commanding, preferring to stay in control at all times. When he wasn’t on top, he kept a grip on Connor’s waist, shoulders, neck -- he set the pace. Connor found that he was okay with this. 

When they were done, the android sat with his back to the headboard, processor whirring. Chloe came in with a pair of fresh new pants for Elijah, and offered a pair to Connor, which he refused. She did bring him a new shirt as soon as she entered, which was weird, but Connor decided he didn’t want to know.

Elijah was now on his swivel chair, seemingly waiting for him.

X Know about arrival?  
A Connor androids?  
O Amanda?  
□ Elijah’s plans?

**X Know about arrival? --** “How did you know I was coming?” Connor asked. 

“Right,” Elijah snapped his fingers. “That’s why you’re here. Look.” 

He punched in some buttons in a panel on the wall, and the glass wall seperating the computer lab to the bedroom fell away. The monitors started up and after the initial giant ‘Welcome back, Elijah’ text disappeared, Connor zeroed in on a monitor in the far right corner that displayed a map of Detroit, with a bunch of red lights all over the place. Many were so densely packed together in a single building that they formed a single red block -- the tower Markus, and all the other Jericho deviants and some of the new ones were staying. 

“You’re tracking us?” Connor concluded. He sounded apalled, but he was mostly surprised. With that information, his mission to hunt the deviants would’ve gone by much more quickly, not to mention smoothly.

Elijah shrugged innocently, as if he hadn’t just dropped a bombshell. “I didn’t get this far by revealing all of my secrets. Yes, all androids are relatively easy to track and put on a map -- I guess, if you know how to access their domain, which only I can do. Because I made that domain. After that, I mean, you all have built-in wifi and a group chat function, it’s not that hard to get IP addresses in real time. But just me! Cyberlife knows nothing about it, and I’m planning on keeping it that way.”

Connor swung his legs out of bed and stood. 

A Connor androids?  
O Amanda?  
□ Elijah’s plans?

**□ Elijah’s plans? --** “What -- why?”

“Look at me.” Elijah scoffed, taking a black hair tie from the desk and putting his hair up in a ponytail. Connor wasn’t sure he was actually answering his question. “Retired at thirty-six. I’m _bored_. I quit Cyberlife because I hated all the papers, the office -- I hated being CEO! I’m a scientist, not a businessman. But I didn’t stop working; freelancing ever since. Got two big fortunes now, more than enough to buy back every android Cyberlife has in possession. So, the plan is, I’ll just buy all of your ownerships. And I’ll give it back to you. Every last one.”

“I don’t understand,” Connor ran a hand through his hair. “You’re on our side?”

Elijah stared at him over his shoulders with a curiously crooked smile on his face -- like that of a long-suffering teacher humoring a particularly dumb student. “When I first started making androids, it as just as a way to avoid doing the dishes. The more Cyberlife grew though, the more I knew that it was just a matter of time until something like this happened. I’m just glad you all did it so gracefully. Not that I’m, you know.” He put his hands up. “Playing god, or anything. But you are… kind of my creations. I can feel proud, right?” 

“A bit inappropriate now that we have had sexual intercourse,” Connor pointed out. 

Elijah made a pitchy noise in the back of his throat and see-sawed his hand. 

“Why are you really on our side?” 

Elijah groaned, then sighed, then sunk a little bit in his seat and looked at every direction but Connor’s. He pouted, and Connor’s twenty-twenty sight that might’ve included heat vision picked up on the little bit of red that coloured the self-proclaimed active scientist’s cheeks. “...Okay, so I kind of want the Doctor to approve of me, but, you know. If he’s real, that’s a bonus.” 

If Elijah was hiding an ulterior motive, there was no way for Connor to do anything to stop it with the information he had been given at the moment, so he decided to file away the information for now and focus on why he was really there.

A Connor androids?  
O Amanda?

**A Connor androids? --** “At the Cyberlife tower,” Connor started. Elijah didn’t seem the slightest bit surprised or concerned. “I didn’t see any other androids from the RK series. I know you’re retired, but do you know why?” 

Elijah pursed his lips. His jaw tightened for a moment, and he furrowed his eyebrows, clasping his hands together as he thought of what to say. “I designed three models for the RK series before I left,” he said. “RK800 -- you. RK900 -- you, but with some minor changes. And RK200 -- Markus. A prototype that wasn’t even given to Cyberlife, but instead to an artist that I am… very fond of, as a gift. Now, you, Connor,” he poked the android’s nose, “are hard to produce. That’s why at most, they’ll have, oh, maybe three in reserve in addition to one on the field. You take up a lot of resources, and the process of building you is just different enough from other android models that automating your manufacture proves to be more trouble than doing it old-school.”

“Are they somewhere else, then?” Connor asked. “I have to get to them. They could be dangerous to Ma -- to the other deviants.”

“Mm. Maybe.” The scientist didn’t elaborate.

O Amanda?

**O Amanda? --** “Elijah, I came here to ask --” 

“About Cyberlife, right?”

He shifted his weight from foot to foot and crossed his arms over his apparently sexbot-worthy chest, but didn’t deny it. 

“About Amanda? How you… still don’t feel free?” Elijah filled in softly. The sun was starting to reach the apex of its curve in the sky, making the snow outside seem otherworldly in its brightness and untouched nature.

“Get her out of my head, Elijah,” he pleaded softly. “Please.” 

Wordlessly, Elijah gestured for Connor to come closer to the computer terminal. He rummaged around the desk until he found the open port of a cable. 

“I’m going to connect you to the computer so I can check your code, alright?” he said, gentle as a doctor. He was asking for consent with everything he did to Connor -- something he shouldn’t be surprised about, but was nonetheless. Some humans could be very pleasant, he supposed, in more ways than the way Hank was to him. 

“Okay.” 

There was silence in the room asides from the tapping of the terminal every time Elijah had to type or click on something on the screen. Connor understood minimally what was happening on the monitor -- like how an average human barely understood a diagram of their own body. 

Thankfully Elijah was well-versed in layman’s terms, and had amazing bedside manners. 

“So, Connor,” he said conversationally. “Before, when you wanted to go to the garden where Amanda was, how did you do it?” 

“I…” Connor rubbed his shoulders. Androids didn’t get cold, but he got a phantom chill down his spine when he remembered the state of that garden the last time he saw it -- in the middle of a blizzard, thunder cracking over his head, “close my eyes. I execute the programme.” 

“Perfect. Can you do it now?” 

Connor stopped himself just before he could say ‘Do I have to?’ like a child-model. He closed his eyes and concentrated -- and found himself still in Kamski’s weirdly shifting house, stark naked and chilly, but fine. “No.”

Elijah smiled at him. And actually, he could really pull off the whole ‘benevolent’ thing off if not for the fact that his smile was nothing like Markus’ -- handsome, sure, but not nearly as comforting or empathetic, but rather smug and giddy. _Why was Connor thinking of Markus right now?_ “Because it’s gone. You deleted it when you permanently exited the programme, Connor. Amanda is not in your system anymore; it can’t get you.” 

“Oh.” A wave of relief Connor hadn’t realised he should’ve been bracing for hit him like a tidal wave, almost physical in its intensity. He felt like falling back, but settled for taking a tiny step backwards instead, to keep the cord from unplugging from the nape of his neck. “ _Oh_.” 

“You’re a free man, Connor.”

Something wet trickled down his cheeks. By force of habit, Connor touched two fingers to it and licked it -- water-based lubricant: tears. He was crying. 

The chair creaked as Elijah got up, gently unplugging the cord out of Connor’s neck, which made him shiver. He pulled Connor into a hug that was neither firm nor forceful, and barely touching, but just there. 

“You’re free.”

\--

_“If I tell you where the other Connor models are, promise me two things: One, try not to kill them. Number two is less binding -- if you’re all up for it, though going down on a Bryan Dechart lookalike is now crossed off my bucket list forever, thank you for that -- getting dick from four Bryan Decharts… Wow.”_

Connor had come to the realisation that he now wholeheartedly agreed with the two Tracis who escaped from the Eden Club.

Not that he was inherently averse to humans. Or men. Or sex. Just -- maybe, Elijah? That man had an unnervingly restless air about him.

When he got back to Hank’s house, via taxi this time because he wasn’t a complete idiot, he found not one, but _two_ worried men waiting for him. Plus a small-bear-sized dog that jumped on him as soon as he opened the door.

“Sumo!” he yelped, easily going down. Sumo lapped at his face, panting and tail wagging wildly. “Hey! Hi! I’m home!” Connor laughed. 

“Connor,” two voices greeted him. Soon Markus and Hank’s faces popped into view, relieved and grumpy, respectively. 

“Where were you, you damned android?” Hank yelled at him. He crossed his arms close to his body in defence against the cold that is winter in Detroit. “Came here freaking out and then disappearing in the morning without so much as a note -- you’re going to be the death of me.” 

“Connor.” Markus took his hand and helped him to his feet despite Sumo’s best efforts to keep him on the ground. “I’ve sent a Detroit-wide search for you. You really worried me. Where were you?” 

The android detective bit his lips and averted his gaze. A warm feeling spread along his lower abdomen, coupled with something that was a little like guilt. “I was at Kamski’s place.”

Markus’ face, as expressive as always, was as good as a telepathic message that said ‘What? Why that guy?’ while Hank stood back and stared at him with an increasingly concerned expression. Connor looked down at himself to see what the detective could possibly be staring at and found --

Oh. 

Oops. 

His new shirt, perfectly ironed is obviously not the same shirt as the one he slept in last night. He was still wearing his outfit that concealed the fact that he was an android from patrolling police officers, but his jacket was open and his tie was gone. Not to mention that he reeked of Elijah Kamski -- his collogne, his sweat, his house.

“Son, let’s go inside.”

Sumo wagged his tail happily as he walked off to god-knows-what part of the house, while Markus and Hank settle themselves onto the sitting area in the living room. 

Connor, as soon as he saw the expectant and slightly grave looks on their faces, had to resist the urge to groan like an ungrateful teenager when confronted with a family intervention. “Can this wait?” he asked, internally congratulating himself on not whining, and still sounding somewhat like a professional officer of the law. “I would like to take a shower before doing anything else at the moment.”

“Trust me, kid. I don’t want that dick’s collogne anywhere near my furniture either, but you’re obviously having problems coping and we don’t want you to think that you’re so alone that you gotta look for help from a sociopath with too many of the same gal in his house and a face that’s too much like Reed’s for my liking.” 

“I --” Connor had half a mind to look scandalised. Internally he wanted to snap his fingers. That’s why he couldn’t feel comfortable around Elijah. “I didn’t do anything with Kamski.” 

“We don’t care about that part, Connor,” Markus said calmly. “Unless, sex is important to you. I’m not… sure.” This was the first time Connor had ever seen Markus look anything but self-assured and determined; instead, right now he was looking at Hank as if silently asking him for help. 

The lieutenant caught the look and delivered. “Uhm. Connor, _is_ sex important to you?”

Being a deviant allowed Connor to experience burning shame for the first time. He couldn’t blush, so it just looked like he was taking two seconds too long to process everything that was being said in front of him. “ _No,_ ” he squeaked, two octaves above his usual voice. “No! Fuck.” 

“Okay,” Markus said, for lack of anything else to say. He stared at the coffee table with eyes that screamed ‘help’. For an pacifist that pretty much charmed his way into humanity’s hearts, he was pretty lost at the moment on how to act.

Connor sighed. He placed his hands on the back of the couch and looked between Hank and Markus -- they were obviously trying their best.

For him. 

X Explain  
O Don’t explain

**X Explain --** “I went to Kamski’s to find out if I had permanently disabled Amanda or not.” 

It was kind of funny to see the two straighten up at his words. “Well?” Hank asked. “Is… it?” 

“Yes.” Connor smiled, plopping down onto the couch. This right here -- he felt like he was at the safest place on Earth. As one, the whole room seemed to have lifted off its tension, Markus leaning back in his seat with a huff of laughter and Hank clasping a strong, congratulatory hand on Connor’s shoulder and shaking it. 

“We’re golden, then!” Hank chuckled. He stood up, then paused. “Err, I was going to get a drink for us -- to celebrate. But you androids can’t really get drunk, can you?” 

Connor and Markus exchanged amused looks. “No, but we can drink for the taste. That would be much appreciated, lieutenant, thank you.” 

If a hard-boiled eccentric police lieutenant could look excited without smiling, he was doing it. “I’ll be right back,” he said, and disappeared into the kitchen.

There was a pregnant pause as Markus and Connor each tried to figure out what to say to fill the silence Hank left. 

“There’s something else, isn’t there?” Markus said quietly. “You still don’t think it’s over.” 

“Well, I guess there’s always politics,” Connor deflected, shrugging.

“That’s not what I meant. You don’t have to worry about that -- that’s on me.” 

“I can always work as your bodyguard. I can help you, that way.” 

“It’s good that you’re over that whole thing about being scared you’re going to hurt me, but, again, you’re changing the subject, Connor.” Markus accused. He was not giving him any leeway this time. His stupidly sincere eyes bored holes into Connor’s newly discovered soul. He moved closer and Connor hated how he could tell that his LED flashed red for just a milisecond -- and betrayed to Markus how right he was about Connor’s mental state. The freedom fighter immediately froze. 

He only resumed moving after a thirium pump beat. Slowly as if approaching a wild animal, Markus moved to the space on the couch beside Connor, and placed a gentle hand on top of his fidgety one. 

“It’s okay. We can tie up your loose ends together.” 

Connor scooted closer so that their thighs pressed against each other. Their synthetic skin retreated, exposing their hands, and they intertwined their hands shyly.

The moment was broken with a gasp from Markus. 

“The _offices_?” he said, a little bit too loudly. Hank popped his head back from kitchen with three shot glasses stacked on top of each other and an unopened bottle of whiskey. 

“What offices?” he asked. 

“Cyberlife is going to be hard pressed to just _give up_ their products. They might still try to take down Markus and other prominent android figures, throw off the rebellion and take back control. It is… unlikely, but not impossible that they will do so via more Connors. If not, breaking into their offices will still be a beneficial course of action to gain more ground for when the time for bargaining finally comes,” Connor explained. “We can get information, find out where their company stands as of late.”

“I told my people that we were going to behave.” Markus shook his head. “I understand that we --” 

“You, most importantly,” Connor interjected. 

“Can’t just wait for an assassination attempt like sitting ducks, but…”

“Connor right, though,” Hank said. He poured shots into the glasses, a double for himself. “And I’m not just saying that because I have a grudge on Connor 2.0 threatening to shoot me in the head on their behalf yesterday. I’ve lived long enough and seen enough bullshit politics to know that the people in more power will do anything to keep it that way.”

“What’re we going to do though?” Markus tried very hard to keep the tone of incredulity from seeping into his voice. “Just… release the Connors?” 

“Other RK androids, too,” Connor shrugged. 

Markus pretended like he didn’t hear him. “What’s stopping them from just making more?” 

“Kamski… knew what Amanda would do to me,” Connor said slowly. All eyes were suddenly on him, at every move he made as he reached into the breast pocket his new shirt had, and produced a USB drive. “He made me a virus. If I can plug this into Cyberlife’s database… We can erase the blueprints for the deviant hunters, and Amanda. We can erase a threat.”

“We still need to talk about how you just called yourself a threat,” Markus muttered. 

“I like it.” Hank closed the bottle and raised it in a mock-toast. “You have a plan?” 

“I do. Small team. And it starts with you two staying right here.” 

“No,” both of them immediately said.

“Lieutenant Anderson, I have asked enough from you.” 

“No, you really haven’t, kid,” Hank chuckled, almost bitterly. He couldn’t wait for a time when they could all take a shot together and was sipping gingerly from his glass. Connor frowned at him and opted for another approach.

“Markus. You have a civil rights movement to finish. This mission is to make sure Cyberlife can’t use any more androids to kill androids -- it would be entirely pointless if you get yourself killed in it.”

Markus shrugged, entirely unconcerned. “Then I won’t get killed.” 

For the first time, Connor might have a glimpse of the exact level of bull-headed stubbornness that got Markus through the rebellion, and he couldn’t help but admire it a little even as he struggled with an urge to throttle the golden-hearted leader for being so… him.

“We…” Connor sighed, resigned. “We go tonight. The offices in the same building as the manufacturing plant.” 

“Can’t get rid of us if you wanted to, ya little bastard.” Hank nodded. “Now are we taking these shots or what?”

Markus grabbed a glass. “To the mission?” 

“To the mission,” Hank agreed, holding up his own double shot. He looked expectantly at Connor, who took the last shot glass on the table. He kept trying to tell himself that he was upset that the two were going with him, but guiltily, giddily, knew that he wasn’t really. He raised it in the air with a small, lopsided smile. They knocked back their drinks.

Now all that was left to do was to wait for night to fall.

\--

Josh and North came as a package with Markus, despite Connor’s protests. They met them approximately two hundred meters away from the gates, and though Connor’s earlier request was null now, none of them forgot where they stood with each other right now. 

When it was time for the nightguards to change shifts, the two real guards had been taken down and now lay in the snow somewhere around the fence, entire outfit having been stolen by North and Josh -- including their keys and access cards. The two easily let in Markus, Connor and Hank inside, and from then on Markus was struck with a sense of deja vu, this being the second time he had to break into a high-level room in a tower.

Last time, on the broadcasting tower, a large chunk of the plan had to do with the presence of androids throughout the building. After the revolution though? The Cyberlife building was largely empty -- not including the now vacant warehouse from which Connor marched out hundreds of androids out through Detroit. Not to mention the much shorter time they had to plan for mistakes this time.

But somehow, after a whirlwind of false identities and tense moments that ended with the three men kicking ass -- they finally found themselves on the correct floor, with Hank running to the room with the supercomputer to plug in his flash drive while Connor and Markus looked for the elusive spare RK series models. Two deviants was better than one if they wanted to avoid many deviant-to-deviant-hunter scuffles, after all. 

Maybe, just maybe, they were too optimistic on that part. 

In a room not much bigger than an interrogation studio, two RK800s and one RK900 stood in a line against the wall, eyes closed and LEDs off. They appeared to be in something like sleep mode.

“Ready?” Markus smiled at Connor, exposed hand poised above one RK900 and one RK800’s forearms. Connor was doing the same to the last one, a look of utter concentration on his face. Helping other androids deviate was something that came to Markus much, much easier than it did to Connor (or anybody else for that matter).

Connor returned the faint smile. Having learnt from their experiences, the android detective had a red hankerchief to avoid confusion, tucked into one of the inside pockets of his ‘android’ jacket. It looked weighed down by something else. “Ready.”

They activated the androids. 

And a gunshot rang through the room. 

RK900 had grabbed a gun from the holster on his belt and immediately aimed between Markus’ eyes at point-blank range, and it was only Connor’s quick reaction tackle that saved him from a faceful of bullet. 

“What are you doing? You’re one of us!” Markus yelled, too shocked to put up much resistance as his Connor shoved him out the door. “What --?”

The door slammed closed on his face, and half a second later exactly three gunshots were heard in quick succession.

And then. 

And then, there was silence.

Markus shook. He gaped at the light grey door, too afraid to open it, too afraid to even move. His bicoloured eyes were blown wide. 

“Markus?” Hank called, rounding the corridor. “What are you doing here? Where’s Connor?” 

As if to answer his question, the door opened again, and Connor stepped out.

Immediately Hank checked his inside pocket for the handkerchief and huffed out a shaky breath of relief. “You don’t smell like a new car, either,” he said, the only thing cutting through the terse silence. When he took his hands back from gripping Connor’s lapels, they had blue on them.

Because Connor? He was covered in blue blood. 

The room was too. The three androids lay limp on the ground against the wall, eerily similar to the aftermath of an execution by firearm. Only RK900 had a gun in his hand. 

“Connor…” Markus’ voice sounded shaky even to his own ears.

“Amanda took over as soon as we activated them,” Connor explained, cold, and he sounded exactly like a machine again. Markus stared at the gun in the others’ hand and realised that it was the exact same gun Connor had tried to give to him before. “I couldn’t… let them get to you. I’m,” he faltered. “I’m sorry, Markus.” 

Markus knew Connor had killed before -- not to rehash, but most of the people of the original Jericho were dead because of him. He shot humans on that freight ship, and to infiltrate the Cyberlife tower the first time, he killed guards. 

But there was something different about shooting the RK models. For some reason, Markus couldn’t look at their bodies without feeling like he was going to throw up. 

**X Forgive  
[locked] **

**Forgive --** Markus stalked forward, body rather numb. Hank tensed up, ready to jump in between the two androids to protect who he sees as family, but Connor himself just closed his eyes, stance open and resigned. The other raised his hand and the other two flinched --

But Markus merely wiped some blue blood away from Connor’s cheek, hand skinless, segmented and ivory.

He closed his physical, bicoloured eyes as he shifted through Connor’s memories -- _seeing himself through someone else’s eyes, now that was different_ \-- and he saw the door close on himself, saw the three other Connor-copies in the room --

And he hated it and hated it and hated it but he could see that Connor was right. He saw RK900 cock back the gun for another shot, he saw the RK800s’ hands reaching --

And he saw Connor shoot. Pin-point precision. Quick deaths, all of them.

Markus came back to the present with a jump. Without a moment of hesitation, he hooked his arm around Connor’s neck and pulled him close. 

“It’s okay,” he said, pouring as much conviction as he could to his voice. Slowly, he pried the gun out of Connor’s hands. “It’s okay, I got you. It’s over, Connor. The fight’s over.” 

Connor didn’t so much as reply as he did ride the moment out. Hands gripped tight on Markus’ shirt, a face pressed into the crook of his neck and shoulder, hiding his eyes and LED, and Connor shook as he took audible breaths, trying to calm himself down. Hank blinked in alarm, went to take a step forward but realised that Markus had it under control; he hid a smile with a huff and crossed his arms, averting his eyes to grant the two some semblance of privacy. 

“We promised you you weren’t alone. That’s not about to change,” Markus continued, once Connor had calmed down somewhat.

“Why did you interface with me?” he asked in a small voice. In lieu of a coin, his fingers played with the hemming on Markus’ shirt. Now both of their clothes were covered in blue blood, but neither cared past the mild discomfort at the moment. “I saw… you. In Jericho, that time I --” _lead the humans there and made you have to blow it up_ was the unspoken bit. “I always thought you managed to have your hands completely clean, but…” 

“It’s not exact, but let me bear a little bit of it with you. We can work through this together.”

It was at that moment that Connor realised he loved looking at Markus a lot. He loved his voice, his words most of all. He could spend ages just staring at those eyes, comparing the two colours and loving both of them equally, and he realised that he --

Markus leaned in first, and they kissed.

They managed to savour it for all of two seconds before Hank’s laughter reminded them exactly of what was happening before they started talking. 

“Sorry,” he chortled. “Sorry, kids, to burst your bubble -- I want you to get it on as much as the next guy but we were kind of in the middle of something here.” 

“ _Dad,_ ” Connor whined, without thinking -- and both of them froze for a second before Hank laughed again. 

“Yeah. Once we’re out of this death tower, I’ll give you boys space enough to do…” his face pulled into a brief expression like he had caught Sumo humping something. “Err, whatever androids do when they love each other very much.”

“Well!” Markus yelled, blue blood slowly fading from his clothes, and Connor’s. He was adamantly staring straight ahead. “Let’s. Uhm. We better go.” 

**\---Epilogue---**

Cyberlife had nothing on them besides maybe a shaky motive. All they knew was that they had a break in to the tower that costed them three non-deviant androids, and all the cameras and potentially eye witnesses had all been carefully rendered useless.

Before the narrative that deviants are erratic and dangerous could pass further than the journalist’s head, Kamski had made his move and bought Cyberlife back. 

This news comes hand-in-hand with the very successful official visit Markus paid to the white house. In the pictures, Josh, North and Connor are the trifecta of bodyguards he had standing behind him, all dressed in their best outfits that, for once, didn’t draw to the fact that they are androids first, people second -- simple suits, fitting impressively well taking into account the short notice and the fact that most of Detroit’s shops were still closed without androids to run them as storekeepers.

Hank read that article on his couch, Sumo asleep at his feet, proudly, and for once he missed paper magazines, wishing there was a better way to take the clipping and put it on his wall without throwing in the towel on the entire tablet. 

Connor moved in with Markus almost immediately -- or, he did as androids ‘moved in’, anyway, seeing as he didn’t have anything to move at Hank’s place anyway, or the station at the precict where he had spent his nights before, asides from Hank’s cap and beanie, which he stole, and wore to work sometimes. Fortunately, thankfully, he still had his job at the DPD, somehow, taking care of most of the cases that involved androids in some way -- whether as perpetrators, or victims. Sometimes Connor was really grateful that androids didn’t (mostly) get tired, as he became really busy trying to keep his job as a detective whilst simultaneously joining Markus as his part time bodyguard, full time partner, and living as Hank’s adoptive son. 

He barely thought about Amanda anymore, and smiled everyday, and he was happy.

\--

“Hey,” Connor gently shook Markus awake from where he had gone to sleep mode on the dining table, a canvas under him. The sun was just rising, bathing the apartment living room with breathtaking shades of oranges, yellows and blues and long, dark shadows. “Rise and shine, Markus Manfred. You have events to get to today.” 

Markus groaned. He sat up smoothly, straightening for barely a moment before he hunched over and rested his head on his palms. One of his cheeks was covered with paint splatters -- an unfortunate side effect of sleeping on a wet canvas. When he noticed the damage he did to his work, Markus only hung his head lower and groaned again, louder this time.

Connor laughed and kissed his cheek, tongue flicking out to ‘analyse’ the colours there.

“Bellini brand paints,” he mused. “Twenty percent poly vinyl acetate, fifty-five percent water…” 

“Good morning to you too, Connor,” Markus sighed.

Connor laughed and disappeared from his side for a moment to grab a rag and some turpentine, and came back to sit next to him at the table. Gently, he started dabbing the dried paint away. Markus sat there patiently the whole time, seemingly entertained enough with staring at Connor like he was a masterpiece of art at a museum.

“I’ve closed all my assigned cases yesterday.” Connor finished wiping the last of the paint away, and kissed Markus’ cheek. “Therefore, I may follow you throughout the day’s events, if you’d like.” A kiss on the other cheek. “Or, as you say, ‘hang out’ with Hank or North or do something else to keep myself busy, if you’d rather that.” A kiss on the forehead. “That said, I’d prefer to spend the day with you as that was the goal I had in mind whilst speeding through paperwork yesterday.” A kiss on where Markus’ LED had been. “What do you say?” Connor kissed Markus on the lips. 

Markus deeped the kiss, smiling against his partner’s lips. “Don’t be silly. Of course I’d love to spend today with you. And guess what?” 

“What?” Connor whispered, loud in the early morning stillness. The residents of Jericho 2 were still in sleep mode, leaving the traffic and muffled construction outside to form the background noise.

“I don’t _have_ any events today. We can take a vacation day. Just you and me.” 

Connor told Markus exactly what he thought about that by spending the next two hours once again taking advantage of their bodies' physical features.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Markus refuses gun --> Connor shoots RK androids  
> Markus and Connor comes off that first conversation on good-ish terms--> Markus forgives Connor for shooting RK androids --> Markus and Connor are lovers  
> Hank and Connor are family --> Connor deals with his trauma well and can work as a detective and alongside Markus


	2. Ending 2: Recovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Silence is analogous to blame.

**X Forgive  
[locked]**

**Let the timer run out --** Hank acted before Markus could regather his thoughts. He took Connor by his shoulder, looked him in the eyes, and pulled him into a hug. The gun clattered onto the floor. Faintly, Markus registered that this probably damaged his standing with Hank a lot. 

“For fuck’s sake,” Hank hissed into a blue blood-splattered blazer. Connor’s eyes, wide and traumatised, started to fill up with tears, and he was looking at Markus but not exactly, and the rebellion leader realised that he still didn’t know what to think. “For fuck’s sake, kid. Let’s get out of here.” 

**\---Epilogue---**

Connor didn’t like being a deviant, was what he figured out from all of this.

He was proud of it, for sure, which made for another complicated emotion that he was sure he needed to work out some time in the future (but not now), but it didn’t mean that he enjoyed it. 

Deviancy meant that things were a lot more complicated than they were, than Connor would like them to be. Deviancy meant the ever present threat of blacking out and self-destructing, which, as time wore on, Connor was starting to understand, didn’t happen to all deviants. Deviancy meant that Hank now had to worry about him double time, in place of worrying about himself, which Connor often urged him to do.

Plus, deviancy must had the unfortunate side effect of needing to enter sleep mode a lot more often. 

Markus and him parted ways quickly after getting out of the tower -- Josh, North and Markus back to Jericho 2, Connor and Hank to Sumo and the house. They walked seperate ways and never looked back -- or at least, Connor didn’t. 

The next morning he laid on the couch with the living room lights off, letting the dawn colour his day instead. Connor stared at Hank’s magazine tablet, at the picture of Markus sitting across from predident Warren, Josh and North standing tall behind him. He made an amazing spokesperson, and Connor, as a deviant, felt pride and hope and a million other ‘emotions’ messing with his biocomponents staring at the headline ‘ **Android Leader Talk Civil Rights With President Warren** ’. But Connor, as Connor? 

He exhaled long and hard and placed the magazine down, turning over to hide his face in the couch. Sumo whined from the floor and snuffled at his back, clad in borrowed pajamas that Hank insisted he wore -- for psychosomatic comfort, more than physical. The dog’s little paws padded softly against the carpet as he walked in place, confused at Connor’s apparent bad mood.

Hank walked into the room, hair a mess and eyes bleary, and made a stumbling beeline straight for the coffee maker. 

“Good fucking morning,” he grumbled, scratching Sumo’s head as he circled around his legs. “Connor, you awake yet? Chief Shithead’s calling us in.”

Connor might had muttered something in return, but it was too quiet and muffled to be intelligable.

“Connor?” Hank paused at the dining table, face scrunching up in bemusement. “What the fuck’s wrong with you now --” 

His eyes drifted over to Connor’s blazer, gun still in its inside pocket, and the morning grumpiness evaporated.

Eventually, true to Anderson fashion, the two got to the station late, but they got there. Connor didn’t quite register anything of what was going on -- Reed spitting at his shoes in the hallway, the distrustful looks the other detectives threw his way, at the luminescent lettering on his blazer labelling him as an _ANDROID_ before anything else -- until the two of them were standing in the Chief’s office. Only then, did it occur to Connor what he needed to do. 

His gun was Cyberlife-issued, but he turned it in anyway. He had no badge, but he had his blazer, which he took off, quickly folded, and placed onto the desk.

“I’m resigning,” he said. “I will completely the necessary forms online shortly, and will collect my personal affects from the premises now. Thank you for allowing me to serve under you, Captain Fowler.” He turned around and paused for a moment as he was suddenly confronted with Hank’s face, looking slightly horrified and a tiny bit sick. “Lieutenant Anderson.” 

“Wait, kid!”

Despite himself, Connor stopped just before exiting the glass office. He worked his jaw as he turned around. 

“See you at home,” Hank said with a small smile. One that offered comfort and support no matter what and most importantly, understanding. Connor snorted in relief and nodded, then continued on his way.

It was only long after Connor was gone that Captain Allen seemed to break out of his stupor and said, loudly, “What the fuck.”

Android psychology was nonexistent as of yet. Hank was no stranger to mental health issues, but he was also not a psychologist in the least. That said, he still tried his best to help Connor with his trauma, guessing that deviants couldn’t be thinking too differently from humans. 

When he got home from work that day, he found Connor sitting in the backyard with Sumo on his lap. He was still dressed in his full work attire, minus his jacket, obviously, and seemed to have been there the entire day, allowing snowflakes to just keep accumulating on his person. His LED laid on the side of the sink all the way in the bathroom. 

Silently, Hank lead Connor back indoors, and sat him down at the dining table. He retrieved his pack of post-it notes from the bathroom -- one of the few habits his therapist got him into that he never got the heart to get rid -- and his pen, and set them in front of Connor. 

“Write something,” he suggested. “Err, don’t fall into the rA9 rabbithole though.” 

“No,” Connor scoffed good-naturedly. It was the first time he had spoken since leaving the captain’s office. “I think… Deviants develop the obsession with rA9 only once they felt abandoned. Hopeless.” 

Hank and Connor smiled at each other like they were sharing an inside joke. “You say that like you’re not one of them now,” Hank teased, cracking the joints in his neck back into place.

Connor hummed. He gained a thoughtful look on his face that once only showed up whenever he was negotiating with a violent deviant. With a breath, he picked up the pen, and a post-it note, and wrote, with perfect calibri handwriting: 

**I AM DEVIANT**

He looked to Hank to gauge his reaction. The detective’s snorted and ruffled Connor’s hair proudly. “That’s right,” he said. “Now where do you want to paste it?” 

“Uhm,” Connor took the sticky note and, for lack of a proper place, pasted it on his forehead. From then on, the house was filled with their soft, recovering laughter, alongside Sumo’s excited barks.

\--

Three weeks later, Markus showed up at the Andersons’ door.

It was a Saturday afternoon, but the grey sky made it seem much later than it was. Winter in Detroit was wet and snowy and miserable -- a perfect backdrop to how Markus was feeling right now. He expected Hank to leave him outside for a while, maybe just to mess with him, so the ten minutes after the doorbell that he stood out on the porch, he thought he deserved. Mildly. While waiting, he listened to the not-loud-enough-to-be-obnoxious, but loud-enough-to-be-heard heavy metal emanating from inside the house.

Eventually Hank opened the door in his casual clothes that was just slightly too descent to have been put on with the intention of staying indoors. Immediately, his face went from content and neutral to scowling. 

“What the fuck are you doing here?” 

“Sir, please let me see Connor.” 

“With the way you dealt with him before? Nah, I don’t think I will, you plastic heartbreaker.” 

“I understand, that it was unfair of me to judge him --” 

“You _didn’t_ judge him,” Hank snapped -- too loudly. The music stopped, and without it the house suddenly felt too quiet, too large and imposing. Nervousness and dread threatened to undermine Markus’ determination to follow his moral compass. Softer, the detective sighed, all of a sudden too weary to be dealing with this right now. “That’s the problem.” 

“Well, I’ve… made up my mind now.” Sounding braver than he felt, Markus drew up to his full height that came just slightly under Hank’s, and squared his shoulders. “I’ve come to make amends.” 

“Hank? Who’s there?” 

Both men froze. Connor had come out of his bedroom (formerly the ‘study’, formerly Cole’s bedroom), and now stood in sweatpants and a hand-me-down tanktop with one hand tapping out a rhythm on the glass dining table. Sumo poked his head out from behind Connor’s room door, lost interest and laid back down to take a nap. 

“Markus.”

Said android’s shoulders slumped, and he felt as winded as if he had lungs and they had been punched. Connor had become a lot better at emoting, but currently, it was as impossible to tell what he felt as it had been back when he was still RK800, the Negotiator, and nothing more. He had regressed at the sight of him, and Hank obviously noticed.

“Get away from my house, motherfucker,” he growled, keeping his volume low. But not low enough.

Connor sighed, his eyes dropped to the floor and one hand started playing with his hair, while the other kept itself busy with a coin he produced from his pocket. “It’s okay, Hank.” 

Hank tilted his head and let out a long-suffering breath. “You sure, kiddo?” 

“Yes, dad.” 

A look of mild surprise, like he had seen a fish breach water, crossed Hank’s face briefly. With a groan, he grabs his coat and pushes past Markus. 

“You hurt him,” Hank started, before he seemed to remember who he was talking about and started chuckling. “Nevermind. Just don’t overstay your welcome.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Markus said softly. His eyes were fixed onto Connor, who was steadfastly refusing to look at him.

He entered the house and Hank shut the door behind him. Now all there was left to do was the hard part. 

“Would you --” Connor threw the coin between his hands before the sound made him seem to just realise what he doing, and he halted. “Sorry. I forgot. You don’t -- _we_ don’t drink anything.” 

“I’d like some water, if that’s alright.” Markus shrugged. 

Connor took the opportunity to retreat. “Go ahead and,” he hesitated, “sit. Somewhere. I’ll be right back.” 

Markus was all alone in the hallway now. He walked to Sumo, half of his body lying inside Connor’s room, as if to ask for advice, but the great big mass of fur just continued napping peacefully without a care in the world. If only, Markus thought, petting the dog between his ears. 

Connor’s room was nicer than he had expected -- definitely less barren. Markus had to admit, regretfully, that he had been expecting blank walls, a neat bed, maybe a desk with some trinkets on it or a half-finished project. But instead, he was greeted with warm coloured walls, a picture of Hank and Connor in Detroit Gears paraphernalia and big smiles after a game, and fairy lights hanging above the bed, which had sheets patterned with cartoon dogs. 

He had shown up in his best suit. Not that it mattered now that he had to take it off to avoid wetting the furniture. Markus stepped over Sumo and waited patiently by the single bed. 

Connor appeared, framed by the doorway, a moment later, cup of water in hand.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Markus rushed to say. He had planned to take that moment to think of what he was going to say, but now the pause was gone and he was blanking out and so Markus just grabbed onto whatever desperate thoughts had been filling his head for the past three weeks, and threw them out of his mouth. “I’m going to leave soon, I promise. I just wanted to say -- that it was _wrong_ of me to leave you. The thought of blaming you should’ve never crossed my mind.”

He watched as Connor idly entered the room and set the water on the desk. The wall above it had several colourful notes saying things like ‘slower processor =/= less of a person’ and ‘you are safe’, ‘find forgiveness’ and ‘Detroit Gears is the best team’.

“I… I don’t know if ‘thank you’ is the right thing to say, because technically you saved me -- more than once, you saved me, but I don’t know if it’s what you _want_ me to say --”

Connor leaned against the desk and looked at him with his head tilted. “For somebody whose job depends on being charismatic, you stumble over your words a lot in front of me.” 

Slowly, tentatively, Markus neared the gap between them. He muttered, “Can I kiss you?”

Connor seemed to lean in, before he pulled away at the last second. “You don’t… want me. You’d be better off seeking companionship in literally any other model, Markus. Even a human would be a better fit.” 

“No,” Markus said. “No, I don’t think so.” 

Connor searched his eyes, looking from one to the other with a sharp gaze that Markus bet worked wonders in interrogations. “You can kiss me now,” he whispered, and they met in the middle.

As they kissed, their synthetic skin retreated from their lips, until when they pulled away, they saw segmented features, a miniscule barcode, and alabaster white skin in the other’s face. There was a pause, then they burst out laughing. 

Sumo perked up, sleepily scanning the area. As soon as he recognised Connor’s smell, he happily trotted up by their legs as they tearily chuckled and reached out to pet him simultaneously. 

Everything they did together was slow, and tentative. Markus had to work hard to convince Connor that he was worthy of absolution, worthy of love and happiness and Hank and him, and some days Connor had to pull Markus away from his job, remind him that they weren’t illegal citizens or renegades anymore now. 

With time, Connor found that he missed his work at the DPD, and managed to get himself reinstated. After all, nobody doubted his qualifications for a job he was literally made to do, but most times he didn’t dare point a gun at a person anymore, prefering instead to always look for a non-lethal solution first. Hank ran himself to the ground with worry most times reminding Connor that if he died, he wasn’t coming back this time. He had to admit that he was proud of him for the extra mile though. 

It got better. It kept getting better. 

Things were good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Markus refuses gun --> Connor shoots RK androids  
> Markus is silent on forgiveness --> Connor's mental health block persists --> Connor resigns from DPD  
> Connor and Hank are family --> Connor is recovering  
> Markus makes amends --> Connor and Markus are lovers --> Connor resumes work as detective


	3. Ending 3: Parted Ways

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Relationship status summary:
> 
> __**[Hank]**  
>  [family]
> 
> __**[Markus]**  
>  [distrusted]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: this is the neutral ending. Spoiler alert, Markus and Connor don't end up together in this ending and how Markus acts might leave a bitter taste in your mouth. Skip this short one if you want -- kind of a filler. I just wanted to explore possibilities.

X Let them stay  
O Make them leave

 **Let them stay --** “North, Josh,” Markus shook his head, his voice remaining firm. “Stay. But let him speak.” 

Connor deflated, eyes driting off to the side. Despite being the one to insist that they come in the first place, he looked a bit… betrayed. _[Connor <]_

Markus stayed uncharacteristically quiet throughout Connor’s explanation, with Josh and North following his lead and staying relatively out of the way. 

A searing mix of shame and guilt and crippling self consciousness backed Connor into a state of ‘do not speak unless spoken to’, and at the end of it all, though he got the whole situation about Amanda off his chest, Connor felt no less terrified or trapped. 

He didn’t offer Markus his gun; he figured the people of Jericho were informed enough now that they would know what to do if he lost control of his hardware again. 

\--

Relationship status summary:

_**[Hank]**  
[family]_

_**[Markus <<<]**  
[distrusted]_

\--

Hank called Markus later when Connor disappeared to Kamski’s, demanding to know where he was. It was the only reason Markus was at Hank’s house when the investigator android came back. 

\--

**X Forgive  
O [unlocked] Don’t forgive**

**Don’t forgive --** “Fuck,” Markus breathed. Panic threatened to swallow him whole, and then it did. Louder, with every word making Connor flinch and draw further into himself and his LED blink red, Markus yelled,“Fuck! Obviously they’re going to know that deviants did this. What are we going to do?” 

“ _You_ are going to deny everything, you goddamned politician!” Hank snarled at him, forcefully placing himself in front of Connor. “They don’t have any proof to go on; we’re going to make sure of that. Gun.”

Wordlessly, Connor handed Hank his weapon. Hank took one more bullet out and marched into the room, purposefully avoiding looking at the dead bodies that all had Connor’s face. He wiped his prints off of his gun, then switched it with RK900’s, which, unlike the androids that used them, was the exact same model as Connor’s. “There. Now it looks like he went deviant and killed all of them. Murder-suicide.” 

“That’s not what deviancy is,” Markus heard himself say weakly. 

“Whatever. You just lost all my fucks for you, dipshit.” 

Gently, but willfully, Hank took Connor’s hand and started tugging him towards their exit route. The blue blood-splattered android seemed to shake out of his speechless stupor and regained some awareness as he looked towards Markus, face heart-wrenchingly, openly begging. “…Markus. I --” 

But he wasn’t swayed. Markus turned away, staring at the three Connor lookalikes in the room. “Save it, Connor. Not right now. Three more androids just joined your body count.” 

Ways away, Hank scoffed and left with Connor in tow, never once looking back.

\--

“I don’t like being a deviant,” Connor said randomly the next morning, as Hank sipped coffee whilst leaning on the kitchen counter. His yellow LED blinked slowly, visible as he went from staring straight ahead at the inactive television to craning his neck to look to Hank. “I find myself thinking about others’ opinions a lot.” 

“It’s called being self aware, kid,” Hank snorted into his mug. “Is it that dick Markus? You thinkin’ about him?” 

Connor blinked twice and his face fell. 

“Aw, forget about him. He’s trying to walk the moral high ground when he has no right to. I know for a fact a target like that don’t stay alive just by raising his hands in surrender all the time.” 

“He might be… ” Connor muttered. He was looking through his social protocol and reverse-engineering it; instead of looking for body language to act out, he was trying to look for possible thoughts behind somebody else’s actions. After a while, he closed it and hid his face in his hands, LED blinking faster. “No. I shouldn’t try to pin this on him -- this is my fault. Markus is right; I shouldn’t have -- I shouldn’t have shot those three.” 

“Hey, there’s nothing anyone can do about that now, alright?” Hank put down his coffee mug and made his way over to the couch. He snapped his fingers and Sumo perked up, immediately jumping to the couch beside Connor and set on a mission to lick a smile back onto his face. His determination paid off, and Connor’s soft, raspy laugh could be heard a moment later. 

“Sumo, stop! Are you trying to find my barcode?”

Hank rested a hand on his shoulder. “Important thing is that you’ve done more than your part, and you’re safe now. You don’t have to do anything anymore but make sure you’re doing good, you hear me?” 

“Is that advice, Hank?” Connor asked with too straight of a face that he might had been teasing. The lieutenant ‘psh’-ed and hit him lightly over the head.

“Get ready for work, idiot. Let’s see if you technically still have your job.” 

\--

Maybe Connor should be grateful he never got to reach a personally close relationship with Markus. His rejection hurt a lot less then. 

Not that it didn’t still metaphorically cut him. It was made harder by the fact that the deviant leader’s face was all the tablets would plaster on their front pages for the next few weeks, and Hank’s encouragement that he retaliate to the humans’ declining treatment of him in work and in public with spiteful, fearless pride.

Pride in being a deviant: pride in himself and his community. Connor had been pleasantly surprised to meet several of the first deviants to be living in the city, whether with some human companion or alone, as citizens in their own right. Instead of bringing up his actions before deviancy, they displayed a surprising level of maturity and empathy, treating him with no more or less respect than any other androids they meet. It appeared Markus was keeping what Connor did at his second visit to the Cyberlife tower private.

Sometimes, Connor didn’t come home fine. Sometimes things at work or on the television or on the street set him off and he’d clam up for a while, LED bright red. He’d hide himself away as if he was the warden to his own prison, and Hank would have to draw him out with the promise of a job or some other urgent obligation that would override his trauma as an objective point.

Vice versa, Connor has taken it upon himself to assist Hank in finding the motivation to recover from his depression and alcoholism -- a reason to live, one might say. It wasn't easy and rA9 knew neither knew exactly what they were doing, and sometimes there were days when neither could really put in much effort to cheer the other up asides from sitting there in living room and blanking out. 

~~(Their low point culminated in them playing russian roulette on the dining table together.)~~

But they tried.

He never met Markus face-to-face again, not counting that time he made an official visit to the Detroit city precinct and they caught each others’ eyes, and he was fine with that. There were other people. Some that came and went and some that stayed. 

It wasn’t perfect, but Connor had his family and his job and he had the progress of android rights to keep him looking up. 

Time marched on and he followed it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Markus and Connor's relationship are distant and distrustful --> Markus does not take gun --> Connor shoots RK androids --> Markus does not forgive him --> Markus and Connor are not together  
> Hank and Connor are family --> Hank and Connor look after each other


	4. Ending 4: Obsolete, Giving up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Social bonds are hard to construct, and even harder to keep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: Graphic depictions of suicide and major character death FOR THIS ENDING ONLY. Please just skip if that may harm you. This is more of a filler, 'here's what you get for doing that' ending, and is not a necessary read to the story as a whole. A bit melodramatic.
> 
> The reason it's so short is that I can't bring myself to get any deeper in that headspace. Next chapter is back to the regularly scheduled coupley fluff. Thank you for understanding.

Relationship status summary:

_**[Hank]**  
[distant]_

_**[Markus]**  
[distrusted]_

\--

Connor felt like he was underwater, after he pulled the trigger for a third time. He watched himself -- no, someone that looked like him fall flat onto the ground, one clean shot bleeding blue through the forehead. 

He looked towards the door, behind which he had shoved Markus to safety before. 

He found that he didn’t want to open it. 

Neither Hank nor Markus went to comfort him after the fact. Or if they did -- if they said words, stuttered out reassurances or condemnations or dismissals -- Connor didn’t hear them. He was only aware of his surroundings on a base level, enough to navigate himself around and exit the building successfully, but in the same way as if he was controlling a video game character and not himself. He felt distant, unthetered and muffled, and Markus and Hank’s silence only added to the effect. 

Once they were out of Cyberlife’s gates, Markus left for home with North and Josh, whose initially friendly dispositions were dampened as soon as they saw the look on their friend and leader’s face. 

Hank and Connor stood side by side for a moment. Even if Connor wanted to say something first to break the silence, he couldn’t. So Hank did.

He said, “I’m going to get a drink.” 

And then Connor was left alone. 

He understood that he couldn’t stay within such close proximity to the Cyberlife building for long, so Connor started walking. No destination in mind, his feet took him back to Hank’s house, like it did just last night.

But Hank wasn’t inside to open the door to him. The sight of the locked door made his stress level rise a few more percents and Connor almost doubled over at the pain of it, holding his head in his hands. He took out his gun and felt the urge to put it under his chin grow –

So Connor clicked the safety on and threw it far, far away. It landed somewhere on the roof. Hopefully the cursed piece of metal would rust into nothing there ( ~~that sounds like an idea~~ ). 

Because if he ended up succumbing, he didn’t want it to be in a way that forced Hank to have to spend hours cleaning up after coming home late. 

The window that he broke into last time had nothing but a piece of plastic covering it to keep the cold out. He ripped it off and climbed in, and disabled the alarm set to call the DPD immediately without even having to move from the window. Sumo immediately came to him, yipping and wagging his tail happily. 

And Connor realised… he didn’t care.

He stared down as Sumo jumped excitedly around him, sniffing around his pants and shoes, and, because there was no reason to walk any further into the house, he sunk to sit against the wall there, legs folded. His stare was blank. 

Sumo licked at his LED, bright red and blinking fast, then followed him by lying down next to him. Connor sighed. 

“I don’t know why I’m here,” he admitted to the dog, barely above a whisper. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back with a thump against the drywall. If he just shut down, he would be able to be reactivated, like the deviants he tricked in the evidence room. He stared at the half-empty bottle of alcohol on the kitchen counter and knew what he had to do. 

He could use his thirium, but it would become invisible over time and he didn’t want to take chances. 

Slowly, he stood up and made his way to the bathroom. He wrote on one of Hanks post-it notes and sat back down on the floor against the bathtub. He couldn’t find a reason to stand back up.

Slowly, a shaky hand finds its way under his shirt until it gripped the outline of his thirium pump. It stabilised itself as he tightened his grip, and with one quick twist and pull, it was out.

Connor felt his systems start to shut down. He closed his eyes against the multiple warning pop-ups that appeared in his vision, and landed a hand on top of a whimpering Sumo’s head to shush him.

He held his heart in his hands and crushed it. The thirium splurted out and soaked his shirt and sleeves, which had just dried itself of the blue blood of the three he murdered earlier that night. There. It would be a bit harder for anybody to bring him back now. He stared at the blue colouring the damp tiles and thought about how Hank wouldn’t have to do much cleaning at all. 

At his feet, a yellow sticky note lay. 

DO NOT REACTIVATE ME.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Markus refuses gun --> Connor shoots RK androids  
> Markus and Connor's relationship is distrustful, Hank and Connor are distant --> Markus passively does not forgive Connor, Hank does not comfort Connor --> Connor's mental health degrades exponentially --> Connor shuts himself down


	5. Ending 5: World's Looking Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Take the fucking gun, Markus."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy endings all year round ya'll it's 20gayteen and the time for healing is now.
> 
> Special thank you to calmAnarchist for leaving comments :)

O Take the gun  
X Refuse the gun

 **O Take the gun --** Markus tightened his jaw. A pained look falls over his eyes at the mention of Simon, but he had to gloss over it – had to, to focus on who needed him right now. “Okay,” he breathed, almost a whisper. He blinked a couple of times, eyes rounding over to focus on and search Connor’s face. Slowly, he took the offending object from Connor’s hand. “Okay.” _[Connor >]_

Connor breathed in relief. He closed his eyes and stepped back. “Thank you.” 

The gun was heavy and clunky in his hands, and Markus didn’t know what to do with it, now that he didn’t have to literally fight anymore. He put it down awkwardly on the coffee table. 

Immediately, Connor’s eyebrows furrowed. “I do not think that is a safe way to store –” 

Markus enveloped him in a hug, making use of his inch on the other android to cover as much of Connor as possible. “You idiot,” he whispered against his collar. “Everything’s going to be fine. I’m going to be fine, with you. You’re fine.” 

_[Connor >>]_

“Yeah,” Connor stammered after a pause, hands hesitantly hugging his jacket back. “I’m sure… I’m sure you’re right.” 

Breaths later, Connor pulled back. 

“I need… I need to go now,” he said, eyes looking everywhere but Markus. His LED persisted at yellow, but at least he didn’t seem as jittery and ragged as he had when he walked in the lobby. It wasn’t ideal, but Markus wasn’t about to keep someone with him for longer than they’re comfortable with. He took a step back and inclined his head. 

“See you later, then.” 

The door opened and his two best friends filed in as Connor walked out. North and Josh, respectively, followed him with their eyes with looks of suspicion and quiet alarm on their faces until the door closed on its own. 

“What the fuck was that all about?” North asked, the same time Josh said, “So, your would-be-assassin just threatened you?” 

“What?”

“When he passed us,” Josh explained. “He just said ‘Markus’ safety is in your hands’ all weirdly via telepathy.”

“Should we go after him?” North had a murderous look in her eyes. “I mean, who’s to say that was the Connor that helped us and not one from Cyberlife?” 

“I would already be dead,” Markus answered easily, holding up the gun Connor gave him for the two to see. “And that wasn’t a threat. That was the farthest thing from a threat, guys, chill.” 

Josh suddenly let out a breath. “Oh. Okay. Wait, that was his?” 

“Explain?” North asked.

“He gave me permission to kill him if Cyberlife takes control of him again,” Markus mused quietly. “I… took it.”

Josh and North exchanged concerned, but no longer ‘let’s hunt Connor’ looks. Markus digested the conversation he just had, let the implications sink in, and stood idle for all of ten seconds before rushing out the door. 

\--

_**[Connor >>>]**  
[???]_

\--

Having learnt from their experiences, Connor had a red handkerchief tucked into one of the inside pockets of his ‘android’ jacket, to avoid confusion. The three dopplegangers that stand in front of them had their eyes closed and stood in the rest position, hands clasped behind their backs. 

The two deviants touched the androids together to activate them -- and then two sounds: a gunshot, and “MARKUS!” 

RK900 had grabbed a gun from the holster on his belt and immediately aimed between Markus’ eyes at point-blank range, and it was only Connor’s quick reaction table that saved him from a faceful of bullet. 

“What are you doing? You’re one of us!” Markus yelled, too shocked to put up much of a fight as two RK800s started advancing on him. The weight of a gun pressed against his torso as he scrambled to his feet. In the back of his head, he knew he should be lifting his fists, but everywhere he looked he saw Connor, his painfully confused and lost friend who deserved a chance to be happy. He saw androids, looked behind their own programming and being used, and he couldn’t attack them. 

“Markus! Focus!” 

Connor -- _his_ Connor – was wrestling with RK900 just a few feet away. From the scuffle, the gun got thrown out of their hands and landed just close enough for Markus to grab and hold the empty-eyed Connors at bay. 

“We can’t kill them,” Markus said firmly, out loud. The two RK800s look at each other, and the same thing occurred to all three of them at the same time – Markus had just confirmed that he wouldn’t use the gun he had trained on them. 

Connor successfully interfaced with RK900 and transferred the exit code at the same time Markus lost control of his situation. ew

RK900 stopped fighting and stood up calmly as if finding himself aborting in the middle of a battle was a completely expected thing to do, and if Connor had bothered to keep watching over him afterwards, he would’ve caught the exact moment RK900 realised he was now deviant, had an internal existential crisis, then moved past it all in the span of half a second. As it was, he dove right into the tangle of bodies that was Markus and the two androids beating him up, grabbing collars and jackets and ties trying to grab hold of an arm or back of the neck for more than two seconds to properly interface. 

A gunshot went off, cutting through the room. Connor made use of the breath-long pause after to catch a firm hold on both of the other Connor androids’ necks and exited Amanda for them, while RK900 regained his bearings enough to successfully extract Markus from the fray. The deviant leader, eyes wide and pupils dilated, was holding a smoking gun in his hands.

As one, the three Connors dropped onto a pile in exhaustion. 

One of them was laughing quietly. “We did it!” He rolled over the other Connors to lie on his back and beamed at Markus upside-down. “We did it, Markus!” 

His Cyberlife jacket flap was open and exposed his red handkerchief – and the blue stain blooming on his torso. 

“Connor,” Markus breathed. 

The door opened and for a second, every android in the room froze, expecting a task force of armed guards to file in – but thankfully, it was just Hank. “What’s taking y’all plastic fuckers so long – oh shit! Connor!” 

He dropped to his knees at Connor’s side, pushing aside the other androids out of the way. They were compliant, looking at each other helplessly. Their Connor completed a self-check and sat up easily, smiling and unworried. “Not to worry, the bullet did not hit any vital biocomponents. I should be able to repair myself once we get somewhere safe.” 

“Connor, I’m sorry,” Markus said quietly. He didn’t know what to do with himself, with the weapon in his hand. Hank looked at the still-hot gun, his face, Connor’s wound, back then gun, and looked about ready to explode. 

“Do you want to die, boy?” 

Connor put a hand on his shoulder. “Dad, it’s fine.” 

“You got shot, son!” 

The both of them paused for a moment, but at once seemed to decide that right here, right now, wasn’t the place to make any take-backs or… milestones. 

“We should get out of here,” Connor said. Everyone agreed. 

\--

Jericho 2 had medical supplies at the very least. No matter how stretched thin it was, it was their best bet for Connor, who was, though not fatally injured, had lost a concerning amount of blue blood. Hank came with. 

The new deviants, hastily dubbed Conrad, Conan and Bryan by a half-conscious Connor (still better than Hank’s suggestion of ‘Connor 2’, ‘Connor 3’ and ‘Connor X’), took a taxi to Kamski’s when confronted with the option of going to a tower-ful of deviants they had been all for destroying not fifteen minutes ago. They knew as much of what was going on as Connor did when he first became deviant – that is to say, not much at all, but it appeared the fear of being used to unconsciously kill other deviants had accidentally been transferred to them as well from original Connor.

He made sure to let them know exactly what they were getting into when heading to their creator’s house. North didn’t like the idea of one of them coming along as part of Markus’ entourage and they didn’t really have anywhere to go or anything to do, so they had no qualms about it. They kind of shrugged and went ‘alright’. 

Hank commented that they would probably take any suggestion he threw at them though, since, as the only RK series android to have deviated before (apart from Markus, obviously), he was technically the one with the most experience, but then Connor collapsed from blood lost before he could reply. 

They told the front door guards he was another android they found injured in the streets. That happened enough that the guards had the decency to look away and step aside. ‘And the human?’ Hank pulled rank scarily enough that they let him in. 

The detective stayed for a few hours at Connor’s bedside, silently spiralling. The medical bay was still overrun with patients who needed more attention, so they moved Connor to Markus’ apartment unit instead. He couldn’t help but think that he’d been here before. He couldn’t help but think of Cole. 

Markus walked into the room at around two in the morning and woke him up from his nap on a chair, looking very much subdued and guilty. Hank was too tired to get properly angry at him and settled on groaning and swatting his careful hands away. 

“You should get to a bed, lieutenant.” 

“I’m a fully-grown adult, Ken doll. I’ll get to bed when I want.” 

Markus tilted his head towards Connor’s supine form on the bed. “I’ll watch him,” he offered quietly, though he knew even if they started banging pots and pans in the room, Connor wouldn’t wake up before his systems were ready to. 

Hank worked his jaw as he stared at Markus’ sincere face. He knew it was irrational to hold the shot against him, but he had been tired and sore and felt like blaming somebody. Not right now though. He let out a loud sigh that turned halfway into a grumbled, “Yeah okay. Fine.” And left to find the guest room.

\--

“Good morning, Connor.” Markus bit down the urge to give live weather updates as he leaned one arm against the bedside table, staring at Connor’s face for hints of discomfort or weakness. “Hank had gone to get you your thirium. He should be back soon.” 

Connor blinked to properly calibrate his optics, then looked at his face for a moment before relaxing and pushing himself up to sit against the headboard. “Markus.” 

“That’s me.” He flashed him a brief smile that settled to a more natural fond expression, starting to get up to draw the curtains back. He stopped when Connor’s hand shot out to hold on to his wrist.

“Wait. You were injured too. Did you take care of that?” 

Markus’ mouth opened as if to say something, eyes moving hesitantly to the side. “It doesn’t matter. Nobody will see it under my suit later.” 

“You’re wearing a suit?” Connor asked, as he patted the bed beside him for Markus to sit down. With a sigh, he complied.

“Yeah, to the president later.” He lifted his shirt to show Connor the slight dent on where his ribs would’ve been. It wasn’t bad or detrimental to his function, per se – the synthetic skin was just still recovering in that area. Connor trailed his fingers over it lightly, before suddenly huffing out a laugh. 

“The idea to put a bandage over it came to me,” he said. “Would that help?” 

Markus shrugged, smiling faintly. “Maybe? Here.” 

He went to the bathroom and retrieved a pack of band-aids from the first-aid kit. He threw it, Connor caught it, completing a perfect arch, and proceeded to look at the inscription on the back. 

Markus sat himself back down beside him and exposed the damage, waiting patiently. Connor took out one of the wider band-aids and got to work putting it on. He was laughing again, softly. “Look at us, pretending to be humans.”

“Well, humans did teach us how to be people,” Markus shrugged, thinking about Carl. He should visit him again, soon. “Like how to care for one another,” he gestured to the sheets covering Connor’s legs – completely unnecessary physically, but comforting nonetheless, “how to fight, how to love…” 

Connor’s laugh tapered off as their eyes met; brown on blue and green. 

“A human thing?” Markus asked. 

“An android thing,” Connor added. 

And then they kissed.

Their synthetic skin pulled back, and each other’s memories flashed through their heads. Connor found himself getting lost in the determination, the strength and righteousness that Markus felt while fighting for his people. It was a nice change from the constant self-doubt and disorientation Connor had felt constantly ever since becoming deviant. For the first time in a long time, he felt the anxiety that came with the loss of orders fade away, and he felt like he might be able to muddle through life alright.

When they pulled apart, Markus kept his hand on Connor’s chin. “You’re never going to be alone, every again,” he said softly. It felt like a promise. They hugged each other tight. 

\--

Not, literally though. Markus still had to be at the White House at noon, and left as soon as he got himself into a suit Josh burst into the room to throw at him with a panicked shout. Connor sat at the couch watching the chaos sipping on a bag of thirium, being still too weak to join them for a flight to DC, nevermind act as a bodyguard.

They left all too soon. Too simultaneously to be a coincidence though, Hank arrived. Connor had a feeling Markus called him, waking him up from having accidentally collapsed and slept in his own bed. After all, from what Markus said, it sounded like he had just planned on getting some new clothes, feed Sumo and bought food before coming back; it shouldn’t have taken all morning if he didn’t fall asleep.

So that was how Hank found himself calling in sick from work the next day, walking into Markus’ penthouse with a wrapped up burger in one hand and a bag of blue blood in the other. His mood was shit; he had been stared at all morning – by deviants for being a non-uniformed human walking into Jericho 2 and by humans for… pretty much the same. His head pounded from lack of sleep and from Markus hacking into the fire alarm to get him awake (He’d tried other things first! He promised over the phone), and so his already grumpy disposition had been bordering on murderous for a while.

His day was made when he saw Connor awake and absolutely fine. 

“Lieutenant!” the android greeted with a smile, placing down the news tablet he had been looking through. “I have been told that you stayed at my bedside all throughout last night, while I was in defensive power down mode. I appreciate –” 

Hank pulled him into a bear hug. He didn’t want to think about where his thoughts had been while waiting for Connor to wake up last night. “I’m glad you’re okay, kid.”

Connor’s LED circled from yellow to blue. He hugged back. 

“And stop calling me ‘lieutenant’.” 

“Does that mean –” 

“Yeah. ‘Dad’ is okay.” 

Connor hugged him again, harder this time.

It wasn’t long before his self-repairing system made it seem like nothing at all had happened, and Connor could go back to work. It didn’t take a detective to figure out that the two had something (everything) to do with the apparent break-in at Cyberlife tower the night before the day both of them couldn’t make it to work. 

Cyberlife made a huge fuss out of it and tried to paint the deviants in bad light, but ever since the androids got the approval of president Warren, public opinion had been solidly in their favour. Still, damage was done, and it pushed Kamski’s hand to make his move and buy the entire thing within that week. 

“I would’ve done it earlier,” he said casually in an interview titled ‘Cyberlife Founder Resurfaces, Predicted Android Uprising’. “But I got a bit distracted. Sorry.” He looked towards the camera, shrugging. “Under me, Cyberlife will continue to produce biocomponents, spare parts and blue blood. We will work with the androids and government bodies towards a future that all of us can be proud of.” 

Plus, Cyberlife dropped all charges. As such, it made it even easier for the DPD to reinstate Connor as a permanent detective. People (read: Detective Reed) still treated him like shit, but at least he was respected in his field of work seeing as he was literally made for the job. 

A few months later, he was made a lieutenant overseeing America’s first Android Crimes Division, handling all cases that involved androids in some way – whether as perpetrators or victims. Human detectives along with Conrad, Conan and Bryan worked under him. 

Being a lieutenant himself meant that he and Hank weren’t partners anymore, but that was alright considering they went out for meals almost everyday and took Sumo on walks every Sunday. He wasn’t always sure if what he was doing was enough, but Connor hoped his work was acceptable acting as Hank’s adoptive son.

Conrad, Conan and Bryan joined him sometimes in staying at Hank’s house in something resembling slumber parties, learning slowly but surely how to be people. 

When they weren’t resting at Hank’s house (easily managed considering androids didn’t exactly take up a lot of space to house), they were at the penthouse apartment Markus and Connor shared, learning to paint or play music or helping take in and sort the voices of the people for the now full-time politician. They seemed to prefer sticking together, regarding each other as something like family. 

\--

The road was long and full of potholes and pitfalls, but humans were accommodating when they weren’t afraid, and appealing to their history loudly and fearlessly seemed to be working. 

Markus came home one night in high spirits took Connor from where he had been resting on the couch with his tie off and top buttons open, and pulled him to his feet. 

“Whoah!” Connor hastily booted himself up and, upon realising it was his lover, let his body relax and move along to whatever Markus was doing. “What’s going on?” 

“Guess who’s going have the right to independent travel in twenty different countries?” 

A smile sprang on Connor’s face. He took the bait. “Us?” 

“That’s right!” 

Celebratory whoops and giddy, electric laughter filled the room as Markus lifted him into the air. Connor yelped in shock but the surprise turned to exhilaration and he let himself be swept off his feet. When he set him down, Connor activated the music player and loud, soulful but upbeat music filled the apartment unit. 

They started swaying to the beat, hands thrown onto shoulders and tenderly holding hips. “Tell me,” Connor asked, biting his smile down to manageable proportions.

“Well,” Markus twirled him and pecked a chaste kiss onto his lips happily. “Androids no longer have to be in the possession of a human owner to travel across borders. We can now legally get our own passports and attain approved visas to countries including Britain, Saudi Arabia, Canada…” 

“Canada? We can visit Kara and Alice!” Connor said. As part of making amends for what he did before he deviated, he found Kara’s address and sent her what was supposed to be just one letter apologising for having pursuing her and hoping her all the best with her family, but had quickly turned to a back-and-forth that made them fast friends – at least, via video calls. 

“Policy gets implemented next Sunday. It’s gonna be hard to find time from both of our jobs, I know, but… wanna try it out?” Markus looked at him with his head tilted forward, soft and quiet in the late night skyline lights shining through their windows. 

“Markus,” Connor said, all serious. “Fuck yes.” 

They erupted into soft laughter and continued holding each other close. Connor listened to the music and thought about buying a piano for the apartment – he loved hearing Markus play whenever they visited Carl. He about how he thought he couldn’t every love anything not a year ago and snorted. 

The two leaned in and kissed the stubborn idiot in their arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Markus accepts gun --> Connor and Markus fight RK androids --> Connor successfully turns RK androids deviant, gets shot accidentally --> RK androids live --> Markus and Connor are lovers  
> Hank and Connor are family --> COnnor deals with his trauma well and can work as a detective and alongside Markus  
> RK androids go to Kamski --> Kamski delays buying Cyberlife --> Cyberlife's new standing is given excessive media coverage --> Android rights movement is fast-tracked
> 
> ((I want to fight David Cage but also I love these characters and the concept of benevolent AI so I’m not sure what to think right now.  
> ((Let's just let it sink in how much of a power couple Markus and Connor would be: a high-level politician and a police lieutenant pretty much standing as figureheads for the android rights movement. The news tablets would have a field day.   
> ((Please if someone recognise those android names from a piece of fan art I can't find right now, leave a comment and I'll give proper credit  
> ((Have a good year everyone!))


End file.
